What is Virtual School
Virtual school is an additional MIS which is designed to enable multiple schools to work as a single entity with respect to their Sixth forms. All timetables and associated entities are produced and managed centrally, cascading to each partner school reducing clashes and duplication, often encountered when schools work in collaboration. Additional features for the most common functions of attendance, behaviour, assessment and examinations can be harmonised through Virtual school, reducing the overall administrative burden of collating and disseminating data from across partners.
Key Features
- Single centralised allocation and management of timetabled groups
- Schools produce the timetable as normal based on their own period structure which is mapped to the central academic structure
- Schools decide which students and subject classes are offered to Virtual school
- Synchronised data flows to and from school to Virtual school
- Transfer of attendance, behaviour and assessment data
- Centralised reporting
- Exam management process
- Student Portal management
- Reporting through MCAS
Features and Benefits
| Feature | What it Does | Benefits |
| Centralised timetable management | Schools create their timetable as normal. They put selected teaching groups and selected students at the disposal of Virtual school | Except “outplaced” teaching groups, partner schools retain full control over their timetable All students are assigned to their teaching groups at Virtual school level Students have a single timetable covering all schools they attend Teaching staff can be allocated across schools Single point timetable management for handling clashes All Timetable changes are made at virtual level and pushed out to partner schools Post-16 learning aims are managed at virtual school level to ensure accuracy for census returns |
| Academic period mapping | Collaborating schools may have varying period structures. Virtual school accommodates multiple structures and turns them into a single structure | Schools can maintain their own period structure for lower school, but which can be converted into a Sixth form structure for timetable purposes The Virtual school period structure creates a standardised structure There is no need to create duplication in partner schools’ timetables to accommodate other centres Students have a single timetable Staff have a single timetable |
| Offering Students and Teaching Groups | Partner schools place students and teaching groups at the disposal of the Virtual school | Individual schools retain control of which students are “outplaced” to the virtual school Partner schools maintain school level data |
| Synchronised data flow | Data is transferred to and from Virtual school to keep data up to date | Partner schools decide how often data is transferred Partner school retains control over their students Where students travel to another partner school, the student will appear on its roll as a guest Student transfer from one partner school to another can be managed without CTF files |
| Attendance flow | Attendance can be transferred to and from the Virtual school | Registers can be taken for students in the normal way without duplication at individual partner schools |
| Behaviour management | A single model deployed at Virtual school can be imported at partner schools to produce consistent reporting across the cluster | Standardised behaviour modelling allows accurate behaviour analysis Staff travelling from one school to another will use the same events Analysis can be done in a single place with no need to collate data from other schools for an individual student. |
| Assessment management | Creating an assessment model at Virtual school level enables partner schools to use the same assessment model | Partner schools follow the same template structures for consistency of output Reporting can be done centrally Analysis is uniform for all students |
| Exam management | Schools can be identified by their home school details | Ease of clash resolution Students are identified by their home centre for ease of exam management Entries could be managed centrally and distributed to partner schools Results transfer to Virtual school for analysis |
| Centralised Reporting | All outplaced general student data is stored both at partner and virtual schools. Shared data from other centres is produced at virtual school level. Reporting is therefore carried out at virtual school level | Full Attendance and Behaviour reporting is available by student Assessment reporting and analysis for students is done in a central location |
| Student Portal | Student portal is used to create accounts for Post-16 student at virtual level giving students access to their own data across schools. | Student timetables are kept up to date in a single location thus avoiding the need produce separate timetables Key data available to students from across partners 6th form homework can be set at virtual level and be made available for students to submit in the normal way |
| MCAS | Sixth form Virtual school has the same MCAS functionality as an ordinary school | Virtual school is available for communication with parents/carers from a single source |